The top office has denied a Japanese media report that claims Seoul has proposed to Washington that North Korean nuclear weapons be taken out of the country first as a way of achieving denuclearization. 

President Moon Jae-in's chief press secretary Yoon Young-chan said in a text message to reporters that the Asahi Shimbun report is not true at all, expressing regret that the Japanese newspaper made a groundless report without a fact check. 

Yoon said the presidential office will actively review a countermeasure against Asahi over the false report. 

In a report released early in the day, Asahi quoted sources on Seoul-Washington relations as saying that National Security Adviser Chung Eui-yong made the proposal during a meeting with his U.S. counterpart John Bolton in Washington on April 24th as part of efforts to mediate negotiations between the U.S. and the North on the North’s denuclearization. 

Asahi said that Chung proposed to Bolton that the North’s nuclear warheads and other nuclear materials be shipped overseas first and the North’s nuclear facilities scrapped later. 

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